Dillon Dube – F, Stockton Heat, AHL

Broke his point-per-game average this week, but another strong week for Dube. We’ll see how long he stays in Stockton.

Zach Fischer – RW, Kansas City Mavericks, ECHL

GP

G

A

P

5v5 P

P1

5v5 P1

NHLe

Up to date

27

3

5

8

6

6

5

6.8

Change from last week

1

0

0

0

0

0

0

-0.26

After his strongest week as a professional, Fischer was scratched for one of KC’s two games this week.

Spencer Foo – RW, Stockton Heat

GP

G

A

P

5v5 P

P1

5v5 P1

NHLe

Up to date

41

10

9

19

10

15

7

18.47

Change from last week

4

0

0

0

0

0

0

-1.99

Four games, no points for Foo. It seems like time to call it.

Glenn Gawdin – C/RW, Stockton Heat

GP

G

A

P

5v5 P

P1

5v5 P1

NHLe

Up to date

37

10

9

19

8

18

7

20.46

Change from last week

4

2

1

3

2

3

2

+1.14

Gawdin had a great week for the Heat, picking up three points in four games, partially thanks to the reformation of the WHL All-Stars line (Dube-Gawdin-Phillips).

Josh Healey – D, Stockton Heat

GP

G

A

P

5v5 P

P1

5v5 P1

NHLe

Up to date

31

1

5

6

5

3

3

7.71

Change from last week

2

0

0

0

0

0

0

-0.54

With Marcus Hogstrom finally activated for action and Rob Hamilton signed, the Heat have been experimenting with defensive options to try and clean up their porous own zone play. That’s pushing Healey to the sidelines, unfortunately.

D’Artagnan Joly – RW/C, Rimouski Oceanic

GP

G

A

P

5v5 P

P1

5v5 P1

NHLe

Up to date

42

13

17

30

19

23

15

16.63

Change from last week

3

1

1

2

2

2

2

-0.09

After taking a game off for maintenance reasons, Joly came back and responded with a goal and assist for Rimouski, his first in both categories since his debut weekend.

Oliver Kylington – D, Stockton Heat – X

GP

G

A

P

5v5 P

P1

5v5 P1

NHLe

Up to date

18

7

7

14

8

10

8

31

Change from last week

–

–

–

–

–

–

–

–

With Juuso Valimaki nearing a return, it’ll be interesting to see what management does with their waiver-exempt LHD. The obvious move is to demote Valimaki to try and help him make up for lost time, but in the long run, it’s likely they don’t believe Valimaki will best be served by AHL time for more than maybe two weeks. It’s hard to demote Kylington, especially given his general inoffensive play and game-winning beauty against Edmonton, so it’s going to be a tough choice. Poor us, having to decide between which two high-ceiling rookie defencemen get to play in the NHL.

Linus Lindstrom – C/LW, Skelleftea AIK, SHL

GP

G

A

P

5v5 P

P1

5v5 P1

NHLe

Up to date

31

1

2

3

2

2

1

3.09

Change from last week

2

0

0

0

0

0

0

-0.22

In his last three games, Lindstrom has played a combined 5:12. Not average, combined. It leads to me to the interesting idea that the Flames might bring him over to North America just so he isn’t stapled to the bench in Sweden.

Ryan Lomberg – LW, Stockton Heat

GP

G

A

P

5v5 P

P1

5v5 P1

NHLe

Up to date

31

5

5

10

8

8

6

12.86

Change from last week

4

0

0

0

0

0

0

-1.9

No points for Lomberg this week.

Andrew Mangiapane – LW/C, Stockton Heat – X

GP

G

A

P

5v5 P

P1

5v5 P1

NHLe

Up to date

13

7

7

14

8

10

7

42.92

Change from last week

–

–

–

–

–

–

–

–

Let’s see how long he sticks in the NHL.

Mitchell Mattson – C/LW, Michigan State, NCAA (Big 10)

GP

G

A

P

5v5 P

P1

5v5 P1

NHLe

Up to date

11

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

Change from last week

2

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

Played in both of MSU’s games this weekend.

Adam Ollas Mattsson – D, Stockton Heat

GP

G

A

P

5v5 P

P1

5v5 P1

NHLe

Up to date

39

4

6

10

7

6

4

10.22

Change from last week

4

0

0

0

0

0

0

-1.16

No points for AOM this week.

Andrew Nielsen – D, Stockton Heat

GP

G

A

P

5v5 P

P1

5v5 P1

NHLe

Up to date

24

0

6

6

3

3

2

9.96

Change from last week

3

0

1

1

0

0

0

0

An assist and an ejection for Nielsen this week.

Mathias Emilio Pettersen – C/LW, Denver Pioneers, NCAA (NCHC)

GP

G

A

P

5v5 P

P1

5v5 P1

NHLe

Up to date

21

5

16

21

10

13

6

36

Change from last week

1

0

1

1

1

1

1

0

Emilio picked up another assist this week. With 13 games left in Denver’s regular season (not including the NCHC tournament or the Frozen Four), could it be possible that he finishes the year still maintaining a point-per-game pace?

Matthew Phillips – RW, Stockton Heat

GP

G

A

P

5v5 P

P1

5v5 P1

NHLe

Up to date

38

10

15

25

15

19

14

26.22

Change from last week

4

0

2

2

1

2

1

-0.74

Back on the scoresheet with two assists after being blanked the week before.

Brett Pollock – LW/C, Stockton Heat

GP

G

A

P

5v5 P

P1

5v5 P1

NHLe

Up to date

32

2

9

11

7

7

4

13.7

Change from last week

2

0

0

0

0

0

0

-0.91

Getting the healthy scratch treatment.

Martin Pospisil – C/LW, Sioux City Musketeers, USHL

GP

G

A

P

5v5 P

P1

5v5 P1

NHLe

Up to date

28

11

28

39

20

29

14

31.98

Change from last week

3

0

2

2

1

2

1

-2

A slow week by Pospisil’s standard, having only picked up two assists this week, though the team as a whole struggled to find the scoresheet.

Rushan Rafikov – D, Lokomotiv Yaroslavl, KHL

GP

G

A

P

5v5 P

P1

5v5 P1

NHLe

Up to date

40

3

7

10

7

6

5

16.84

Change from last week

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

No games for Rafikov this week.

Milos Roman – C, Vancouver Giants, WHL

GP

G

A

P

5v5 P

P1

5v5 P1

NHLe

Up to date

37

18

18

36

16

30

10

24.09

Change from last week

3

0

2

2

1

1

0

-0.67

Two assists for Roman this week, who has remained strong for the Giants post-WJC.

Adam Ruzicka – C/LW, Sudbury Wolves, OHL

GP

G

A

P

5v5 P

P1

5v5 P1

NHLe

Up to date

41

15

27

42

21

31

18

27.13

Change from last week

3

2

0

2

2

2

2

-0.75

Although it’s early, Ruzicka appears to have found his more all-around game with Sudbury, relying less on powerplay time to generate points. All but one of his points with the Wolves are primary 5v5 points.

Kerby Rychel – F, Stockton Heat

GP

G

A

P

5v5 P

P1

5v5 P1

NHLe

Up to date

39

17

16

33

20

22

13

33.72

Change from last week

4

1

1

2

0

1

0

1.58

Another strong week for Rychel, who picked up a couple of points as per usual.

Filip Sveningsson – LW, IK Oskarshamn, Allsvenskan

GP

G

A

P

5v5 P

P1

5v5 P1

NHLe

Up to date

29

10

10

20

8

15

7

33.70

Change from last week

2

1

0

1

0

1

0

-0.69

Another week, another big powerplay contribution from Sveningsson.

Eetu Tuulola – RW, HPK, SM-Liiga

GP

G

A

P

5v5 P

P1

5v5 P1

NHLe

Up to date

42

8

17

25

11

16

6

22.06

Change from last week

5

2

2

4

1

3

0

+1.67

A monster week for Tuulola, who awoke after a few weeks of point-less slumber. He picked up three points in a 6-5 comeback victory, assisting on the last-minute tying goal and ending it in OT.

Rinat Valiev – D, Stockton Heat

GP

G

A

P

5v5 P

P1

5v5 P1

NHLe

Up to date

32

1

9

10

5

4

3

12.54

Change from last week

4

1

1

2

0

1

0

+0.71

Another big week for Valiev, who picked up his first goal as a member of the Flames organization. Maybe there’s more than meets the eye here.

Dmitri Zavgorodniy – C/LW, Rimouski Oceanic, QMJHL

GP

G

A

P

5v5 P

P1

5v5 P1

NHLe

Up to date

46

20

27

47

27

32

18

23.79

Change from last week

4

1

1

2

2

1

1

-1.16

Still in a slump, relatively speaking. His NHLe has dipped by about seven points in the last two months, and by three points in the previous month alone.

Jon Gillies – G, Stockton Heat

GP

TOI

SV%

Up to date

26

1371

0.867

Change from last week

2

118

0

Not doing so well. Allowed four on 30 shots (0.867) and five on 36 shots (0.861), both against Bakersfield.

Mason McDonald – G, Kansas City Mavericks

GP

TOI

SV%

Up to date

12

674

0.907

Change from last week

–

–

–

Hasn’t played in a while.

Tyler Parsons – G, Stockton Heat

GP

TOI

SV%

Up to date

11

572

0.892

Change from last week

2

125

+0.021

An absolute monster of a week for Parsons. First, he stopped 49 of 51 shots (0.961) against the Texas Stars, good for a Heat team record, and then doubled down with a stellar 29 of 30 (0.967) in a shootout loss against Colorado. I won’t declare the Stockton goalie problem solved right now, especially given some of the volatility of Parsons’ numbers thus far, but he’s probably earned the starter’s net for the next little while.

Nick Schneider – G, Kansas City Mavericks

GP

TOI

SV%

ECHL Up to date

12

725

0.889

Change from last week

2

123

-0.05

AHL Up to date

11

220.16

0.922

Change from last week

–

–

–

Back in the starter’s net for KC, but not a lot of success. Allowed four on 29 shots (0.862) and six on 27 shots (0.778), both against Wichita.

While I generally agree with this view I also think BT has to realize that this years team has a real solid chance at winning the cup. The cost of adding the right pieces for an improved chance to win the cup needs to explored.

None is an awfully big number in this case. We currently have 20 in the next 3 years, out of the 21 we are allotted. Anything below 4 is unlikely to ever be a NHLer, but of coarse they also have little value on the trade market anyways. So lets talk about the top 3 rounds. We have 8 of the 9.

That was my stance as well when the discussions of “going for it” began. My immediate reaction was to leave the 1st rounder out, but all others were on the table.

According to Pinder and Steinberg, there are less than 5 players on the market that will obtain a 1st round pick in a trade. Mark Stone is one of them. As he could only be a rental, I would say no. Kapanen is not one of the guys considered to be worth a 1st, nor is any goalie, including Howard (not my info, P&S said that).

As almost all trades using our first would mean a rental, that trade should be off the market. All others to make a run should be put in the mix. This is the year.

I just wouldnt use the 1st and 2nd at all. Look at our draft selections when we had those picks: Valimaki, Kylington, Ras, Dube, Parsons. And thats not touching the obvious picks like Mony and Tkachuk. Heck they even got Fox in the 3rd recently.

Our scouting is pretty underrated in my opinion, and I just wouldnt put all the eggs in one basket. If BT can swing a deal and moderately fleece a GM (Im looking at you Chiapet), then 100% do it, but not with the next 1st and 2nds. I think those should be borderline offlimits. The cup is a marathon, not a sprint – both throughout the season and over the course of multiple seasons.

We don’t have a second so don’t lose any sleep over that. Lot’s about what BT does will be determined by what others do and what the market is. If he does nothing and it’s a buyers market and we lose out to someone who bought the right piece he will hear about it.

The Flames couldn’t afford anyone who would require the first or second round pick. What could edmonton possibly offer The Flames. Except their top 3 players literally every player on the flames is far better than anyone they could possibly offer up.

My view on using the first rounder is that it must be for a guy with some term left or for more than one asset in return. A guy picked 24-30 looks less and less likely to be NHL ready next year. We are in a window to win; how long that window lasts I don’t know but BT sure needs to explore winning this year. (the window is it till Johnny’s contract expires, does it drop off at next years TDL when the Flames have to decide what to do with TJ and Hamonic and resign the kids on D, I don’t know)

It should be JG’s contract -1 so that we can trade him and get value. If he goes to UFA status we will lose him for nothing, and resigning him may be difficult with the cap situation in the years ahead.

With the logjam of teams around the wild card spot and 3rd place in the central it makes for an interesting TDL. At this point it seems that few teams are selling and lot’s of teams may be buying; that means prices go up. Now in 3 weeks if the wild card picture clarifies itself maybe things change. Just don’t overpay.

I’ve been reading around that it’s leaning towards a buyers market. There are a lot of defenceman available, and especially when it comes to goalies. There seems to be quite a large number of UFA pending players this year.

Once the log jam takes place that might be correct but at the moment there are a lot of teams that are asking themselves what to do. The rumours out of Edmonton is that they will buyers; that alone probably drives prices up. In the West alone I think only 1/2 teams think they are out of it. In the east maybe 4; that leaves a lot of buyers and only a few sellers. How many UFA’s are there on those 6 teams?

So of the 6 teams that probably have decided that they are sellers(Ottawa/Detroit/LA/Chicago/Philly/NJ) there are 17 FA Forwards, 7 D and 5 goalies. The classic rentals. Some will likely be very expensive(Ottawa’s 3 forwards) and some will be cheap rentals. Others have NTC’s etc. At the moments the numbers are low. 25 teams think/hope they are still in it because of the log jam around the wild cards.

Hypothetically, what if Calgary trades their 2019 first for help at the deadline, but get a 2019 or 2020 second as part of the package coming back? Assuming Calgary wins their division and gets second overall, they probably won’t pick any lower than 26th overall (division winners pick 24-27 unless they make the conference finals, in which case they pick 28-31). If they are getting back a pick in the 32-45 range in either 2019 or 2020, there probably won’t be a huge difference in the quality of player they select.

Actually, I was at the Spitfires/Otters game the other night (man Erie sucks now) but there’s this kid from Windsor named Jean-Luc Foudy we should be keeping an eye on. He’s only 16 so not eligible until 2020, but he got first star and he’s got 34 pts in 41 games, including 18 in his last 12. Best player on the ice by far (though that’s not saying much considering they played Erie).

The problem with NHLe is that it doesn’t discriminate by age. Based on NHLe you would think that Rychel was the 4th best prospect the Flames have, but he is now 24 and hardly a prospect anymore. NHLe is also a prediction based on models devised from very noisy data – there should be confidence intervals on those numbers.

I think having their age/years since draft info would be useful context.

No kidding Kzak.. MM be gone after this year. Do you know how Demko doing? Easy to look back in hindsight tho I guess.. Goalies are such a crapshoot, may as well draw names from a hat lol. Good to see Parsons steady his game some ?

WW lost his mind a nanosecond after MM was drafted and posted it here. He said it was a mistake the second the choice was made. I was prepared to give MM a chance at the time but I readily concede WW was right. Demko was the choice. The Canucks returned the favour with the Tkachuk oops though.

WW wasn’t the only one losing their mind over that pick that day. I was furious calling for firings of Burke and BT. Even at the time it was just an obvious bad pick. It still blows my mind that the scouting and management team could not see how bad of a choice this was back then.

well i see us being busy at Draft day , i know it down the road but a good GM play a head we need to move some $$$
i see TJ being move we not going to resign him in 2 years cause we need it for the 3 cool Rookie D man by then.
Plus Seattle will join the NHL by then and we not going to protect Tj on that List. so sale him when he on Stat high..
Fro,Stone will be gone too….
Side Note:
after what Oilers just pay Koskinen. what would you think BDS camp going to ask BT ?

I saw that Koskinen contract and bugged out, but Koskinen is
a) older and
b) has a longer track record in the KHL (=~ AHL in terms of quality) where he performed well.

I think it puts upward pressure of Rittich’s contract, but it is mitigated by a few things:

1-Rittich has a lot less pro experience
2-Rittich really struggled last year
3-Koskinen was earning 2.5 million this year, so they weren’t going to give him a pay cut. Rittich is only earning $800K.
4-Rittich is still an RFA, though he is arbitration eligible.

No doubt Rittich and Tkachuk are going to cost some money. As usual, the Oilers raise the pressure on everyone in the league to overpay goalies now. The agents and players must love it when they see this happen. Going to be interesting to see what the Maple Leafs do with their big signings coming up (Matthews and Marner). That Nylander deal was another ‘shake your head’ signing. All these signings ahead might be the thing crippling the team play now of the Maple Leafs. On the other hand, the Flames moving ahead with excellent team play. Glad they are focused on winning. GFG. And glad to read Parsons has raised his play of late.

I don’t watch much NCAA hockey but try and find lists of guys who will be FA; one name that I have found is Jimmy Schuldt; he is a LHD that is highly regarded. Part of the 10 names for the Hobby Baker trophy. Anyone know anything more about him?

There have been a lot of guys who leave college early in recent memory – but most of them are first round picks. I can’t think of a late round pick who was signed after a year or two of college – Even Johnny went the full four. My guess is that MEP will probably play a couple more seasons, unless he pulls a Fox and tips his hat that he won’t sign in Calgary.

The more I look at this team and the current signings, the more I realize that this year and next are the “Cup” window years. It is why we need to go all in this year.

Cap hell begins when we sign Byng in the summer. It will tie our hands next season, but we still have a few cap friendly deals on the books, including most of the core. Benny and Ritter will only add to the difficulty when they hopefully sign in the summer.

The real problems begin in the year after that, 2020-2021. Janko, Frolik, Brodie, and Hamonic are up, as are Ky and Andersson. Frolik may be done, but he still would need replacing. As much as he appears to have had a rough season, he has produced this year. We have wins because he is in the lineup.

Brodie and Hamonic are the key losses, Hamonic in particular. He is the type that win cups, big, strong, solid. Replacing them will cost way more than we currently pay them. Sure, Andersson and even Ky may be their replacements, but if they fill the void, then they are signing for north of $5 million each in two years. The 2 spots occupied by Hammy and Brodie are not coming off the books, just the players in them.

Gio can be put in ink for the next 2 years, after that, we need a pencil. Age may hold off for a few more years, he is fit after all, but it is more likely it starts to take hold. There is no cup run without him at the top of his game. That is now.

I dont like the phrase “cap hell”. I think that should be reserved for teams like Kings, Hawks and Oilers, who are all loaded with deterioating assets with monster contracts. The Flames has 1, maybe 2 (depending on how Gio maintains his body but not worried about that at all). The Flames may be tight with cap, but definitely not in cap hell as everyone with big contracts are YOUNG and CORE pieces. Thats a huge difference.

Next year for me is when the team go for broke. As you mentioned, core dman coming off their contracts and renewals for young players are due. Thats when the team should really go for it and grab some rentals at the TDL. They might not be performing as well as this season, but more experience in navigating the closing stages of the regular season and latter stages of the playoffs.

The keys to staying out of cap hell after the Byng contract is signed is two fold; avoid signing overpriced FA and getting guys like Janko, Kyl, Anderson signed to good deals. I suspect depending on how next season goes BT will move one of TJ and Hamonic and resign the other. Stone will be gone and Frolik will hopefully be replaced internally by Dube or one of the other young forwards. BT and his staff also need to scour the unsigned FA market NCAA/CHL/Euro to fill the holes on D.

Between Ryan, Frolik and Smith the flames have over $11.5 million in salary they can displace. They are replacing that with Chucky signing for mark my words $6.9 times 7 years. Add Czarnik and that makes it $12.7 million. You sign Ritter for again mark my words $3.5 times 2 to 3 years. That leaves you a few million. That gets eaten by the raises Jankowski and Bennett will get however the salary cap is going up a few million.

I am honestly not concerned even a bit!

The key to all this is how does Dube, Magicpenny develope and evolve over the next few seasons

When they signed Neal and Ryan it limited the teams capability to adjust to seasons like this one where three players have truly emerged. The good news is that they have an extra defenseman from either side that can be traded in the off season or before. Stone could be dealt at the TDL if he is health and Hanifin can go this summer, at that point the cap hell is eased.

My worry is when they come back from AS/bye week. That is when things really went off the rails last year, and it’s an even longer break this year. They had won 7 in a row heading into the bye week, then lost six straight right after (a period that included the AS break). They were 12-19-6 after the bye week last year. The huge break seemed to kill their momentum, though they’d have to melt down even worse to miss the playoffs this year.

It is a worry but as Hockey83 says this team has a different make up. Better coaching; I doubt BP will need to throw a stick to get their attention. He seems to be the best of Hartley, Sutter and GG. The core pieces are a year older and it looks like(touch wood) they are healthy. This team has a completely different mentality than the GG one.